Visions of the NYC Subway

 

George Santos & Lester Chang: Flimflammers Are Why Nepo Babies Thrive

I really need to start an "ahead of his time" label for this blog because, once again, Mr NYC is ahead of his time -- specifically, this time, about nine months. In March, 2022 I wrote a blog post about Mayor Eric Adams and how his nascent mayoralty seemed to be all about flash over substance, about how he had no clear vision or policies for the city, about his associations with questionable characters, and, most of all, just about what a weirdo he is. 

Well, now, Vanity Fair has written an article about his first year in office and concludes much of the same thing as I did. Read it, then read my blog post from nine months earlier, and see if I wasn't ahead of the curve in this assessment of Mayor Adams.

That said, I will give him this -- Mayor Eric Adams is who he says he is, and his resume prior to being mayor was impressive -- more than two decades in the NYPD followed by service as a State Senator and a Brooklyn Borough President. He is, at least in NYC political terms, the real deal, l'article genuine -- even if we don't know where he really lives. To sum up Adams, he's a political heavyweight and a policy lightweight.

Even though there's a stench of dishonesty and sleaze around Eric Adams, he is who he says he is and worked really hard to get where he is -- literally over decades. 

Which, of course, brings us to George Santos, the new Congressman-elect from Northeast Queens (and Nassau County but who cares about that?) who's entire life -- his education, his resume, his finances, his religion, maybe even his sexual orientation, is completely bogus. How a complete charlatan like this could get elected in the New York area is well, if not completely, described by Steve Isreal who used to represent this district in Congress several years ago. His conclusion is that Santos got through due to complete and utter apathy by the NY political class, the media, and voters. This is obvious, not only in the case of Santos, but in the case of a recently elected Brooklyn assemblyman named Lester Chang who, it turns out, doesn't really live in the district. If his opponents and the media had done their homework before the election, they would have exposed all this and the voters would have known that frauds were running to represent them. But they didn't know, and now New York has these twin political messes to deal with. 

And it got me thinking. 

Recently New York magazine published a bunch of articles about "nepo babies" or people who have succeeded, in this case, in showbusiness largely because they have parents who were already in the business -- and had all of the connections and power needed to launch their kids' careers. Nepotism is as old as human history, of course, parents have always wanted to give their kids and family members every advantage to succeed -- power begets power, wealth begets wealth, opportunity begets opportunity. There's a reason why so much of human history has had hereditary monarchies and titles, why the legal concepts of inheritance and primogeniture exist, and so forth -- families want to keep their wealth and power intact for generations to come; they want, in a word, legacy. 

For example, the great director John Huston has been dead for over 35 years but his son, daughter and grandson all have big acting careers. The Huston name is still important in Hollywood today, even decades after the big man's death (and John Huston's father was an actor as well so there you go). 

The triumph of nepotism in America, of course, makes a mockery of the concept of "meritocracy", a cherished American notion that everyone who achieves success did so only through their hard work, and that nothing else matters. This is and always has been BS, of course -- hard work without connections is meaningless. Family support can be vital. But nepotism is powerful not only because powerful, wealthy, and highly-connected people can create great opportunities for their kids. It's also because people who come from such families have what you might call instant credibility, you can do an instant background check on them, you know who they are because you know who their parents and families are. You know the ecosystem, the environment they came out. Nepo babies are a brand, of sorts, a known quantity, and there's an almost instant comfort level with them because you know "their people."

That's why, decade after decade, people named Kennedy and Bush kept getting elected to political office. We know them, even if we don't really like them. 

And that is the huge barrier that people without such connections, without such family power, who are starting out in their careers, face. They're outsiders, unknown, almost bewildering creatures. Such career strivers, such outsiders trying to get inside, are often derisively called "climbers" or "gatecrashers" or "wannabes." They are held suspect until they prove themselves worthy. They have to prove themselves a lot, they have to be the best of the best of the best, they have to smart and crafty as hell, they have to be able to find and exploit every opportunity, they have to work really hard and have a lot of extra special luck to "make it" -- and, as soon as they do, such "self-made" people become "nepo parents" all their own.

George Santos and Lester Chang felt that they needed to lie and cheat in order to thrive. They are blatant climbers but they obviously didn't posses the superior skills, hard work, or clear opportunities to succeed honestly, to succeed on their own -- so they lied and cheated. They're flimflam men, and they are the kinds of people that scare what you might call the Establishment, the gatekeepers, the powers-that-be. The Establishment doesn't want criminals or liars or people they deem unworthy in their midst. So this is why nepotism  and "nepo babies" thrive -- better to go with who you know, better to stay in your comfort zone, better to give opportunities to the people are already "pre-approved." The Establishment doesn't want to let in someone who hasn't, in their view, demonstrated the superior abilities to earn membership in it -- but coming from the right family means you're there already. 

The Establishment doesn't lift the gate to just anyone who doesn't already have family on the other side of it. 

In many ways, I feel sorry for Santos and Chang -- they see what others have, namely money and power, and these guys want it to -- but they have neither the connections nor the skills nor the opportunities to get it on their own, they are unable to do the very hard work to get it, to prove that they're better than the nepo babies around them -- so they lie.

And compared to these guys and any other possible "flimflammers" in our midst, going with a nepo baby is a safe choice. 

What's the Deal with Apple Bank?

New York City is chock full of financial institutions, including many, many banks. There are numerous small banks, mostly clustered in various neighborhoods, but the big ones are JP Morgan Chase and Capital One and TDBank that have branches all over the city and country.

The bank that has always intrigued me, however, although not enough to become a customer, is Apple Bank. I don't know anyone who has ever had an account there, who's ever used it, and there don't seem to be very many branches for it around the city. But it's been in business for over almost 150 years and is a stalwart of the NYC financial community. 

Apple Bank is most notable for two things in my mind. First, it appears to sponsor a large number of events around town -- including the St. John's basketball team (I recently went to a game and saw its logo all over the place). Second, Apple Bank has probably the most impressive headquarters of any financial institution in NYC -- the large, fortress-like building on West 72nd street and Broadway, looming like a stern parent over Verdi Square (known back in the day as "needle park"). It's a formidable structure, military-like, and in a residential neighborhood with many impressive buildings (like the Dakota and the Ansonia), the Apple Bank building is an odd anomaly, a strange and permanent interloper of an edifice.  

The Apple Bank building is not only a financial headquarters -- it's also an apartment building with super-expensive residences therein. If you want to check it out, and can swing $12,500 a month in rent, you might find your next home in this iconic if underappreciated NYC building.

P.S. Apple Bank has nothing to do, it should be obvious, with Apple the computer hardware giant -- obviously Apple Bank is derivative of "the Big Apple." Also, the had a different name for a long time before it became Apple Bank -- it started as Harlem Savings Bank in 1863. In the 1980s Apple Bank even ran TV commercials (see below) but, apparently, no longer. 

The (Not So) Talented Congressman-elect Mr. Santos

"If you can make it here, you can make it anywhere."

And if you have no education, no professional credentials, are a wanted criminal, and, basically, are totally unemployable and have have nothing going on in life, you can still make it big in NYC by becoming ... a Republican member of the United States Congress! 

Footage & History of the Five Boroughs of New York City (1946)

 

Angelo Badalamenti RIP

Brooklyn native, graduate of the Manhattan School of Music, Angelo B was a brilliant composer of music and film and television scores. He worked with David Bowie and Paul McCartney, and composed music for many directors, most notably David Lynch. 

While Angelo B had a long career, perhaps he's most famous for the music he did for Twin Peaks. It is so brilliant, so magical, so amazing, that it define the word haunting. It's perfect. 

RIP.

Trotsky in Da' Bronx

A few years ago I wrote a short blog post about some of the more memorable headlines that have appeared in the NYC newspapers over the decades (most recently, in reference to the Good Morning America anchor adultery scandal, it was "Good Moaning America").

Anyway, in late 1917, a headline appeared in a local paper called Bronx Home News that had to make its readers do a double-take: "Bronx Man Leads Russian Revolution." 

The man in question was Leon Trotsky who, after Vladimir Lenin, became the second most powerful person in the newly formed Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the world's first Bolshevik i.e. Communist nation. Wrecked by its disastrous participation in the First World War, the centuries-old Russian Empire crumbled into chaos. After numerous political convulsions, the world's largest nation, once ruled by the sacred autocratic Tsars, turned into a supposed "workers paradise", a hypothetical communist utopia.

It was not to be, obviously, but in late 1917 no one knew that -- all that Russians knew was that a failed and discredited monarchy had been destroyed, and a new socialist experiment had come along. Trotsky was one of its primary leaders, its main apostles, and for the next decade he would exercise awesome power -- until, he too, met his ruin at the hands of Joseph Stalin. 

A professional revolutionary, Trotsky lived a nomadic, stateless existence. A wanted man in Russia, he was exiled to Siberia twice, and spent most of his time bouncing around Europe (Switzerland, the UK, France, and Spain) before arriving in NYC in January 1917. His first impression of the city was: 

"Here I was in New York, city of prose and fantasy, of capitalist automatism, its streets a triumph of cubism, its moral philosophy that of the dollar. New York impressed me tremendously because, more than any other city in the world, it is the fullest expression of our modern age.”

Taking up residence on either 164 street or 172 street in the Bronx (it's not certain exactly where he resided), Trotsky lived in the city for only ten weeks, leaving in late March 1917. However, he made the most of his brief American sojourn, doing research and writing at the New York Public Library, engaging in anti-war debates at Cooper Union, going to food protests in St. Mark's Place and City Hall, and engaging in socialist agitation. It's important to remember that, prior to the Russian Revolution and the Cold War, there was a strong socialist movement in this city and country before the FBI and the government shut it down. Trotsky's goal was to organize socialist activity in America -- but then, in March 1917, revolution broke out in Russia. Trotsky left, sailing away from NYC and into history. 

Perhaps, during his brief time in NYC, Trotsky should have realized that communism would fail. Even though he lived in a small and modest apartment, he was shocked to discover that it had things like electricity, heat, a phone, and even a garbage shoot. He could see, even then, that America was the future.

Back in Russia, Trotsky participated in the October 1917 Bolshevik seizure of power. Almost immediately a civil war broke out between the Reds (the Bolshevik forces) and the Whites ("monarchists, conservatives, and Tsarist generals", as the sneering Ian Holm character says in the 1971 movie Nicholas & Alexandra, "all our enemies). Trotsky led the Red forces to victory as War Commissar in 1922. This victory cemented the Soviet Union's existence. Trotsky was at the height of his power.

But in 1924, Lenin, the USSR's first leader and Trotsky's patron, died. A vicious power battle between Trotsky and Stalin ensued. Trotsky lost and was out of power by 1925 -- and by 1929 he was out of the Soviet Union, exiled from the nation he had helped found, resuming a stateless, rootless life. He eventually landed in Mexico City, living in a guarded house, until he was killed by a Stalinist agent who buried an ice pick in his head in 1941.

If Trotsky has survived, if he and not Stalin had become Lenin's successor, the history of the Soviet Union and the world would have been much different. Perhaps it would have become a humane socialist nation. Instead, with Stalin, the USSR became a cult of personality, it became a terror state of gulags and death, it did not become a worker's paradise, it became hell. Trotsky was an idealist but Stalin was a brutal tactician -- and that's why history played out the way it did.

At least Trotsky got to spend some time in NYC -- most of his fellow revolutionaries never did. 

Apropos of my comment about the 1971 movie Nicholas & Alexandra, I highly recommend it -- it's an old-fashioned costume epic about the last Tsar and his wife, the kind of big movie they don't make anymore. It also has an amazing cast including a very young Brian Cox who plays Trotsky. If you're a fan of his hit show Succession where he plays an old, super wealthy media titan, it's cool to watch him in this movie, nearly 50 years earlier, playing a young idealistic Bolshevik revolutionary. There aren't any scenes in NYC, sadly, but it's still worth watching. 

Farewell to Trevor Noah's Daily Show

Christopher Lloyd & Christopher Walken in "Macbeth" at Lincoln Center Theater (1974)

 

Review: "Fame" (1980) and Its Legacy

Warning: This movie review has a tiny plot twist all its own at the end. Read on!

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This summer I finally got around to seeing a movie that had been on my "When I get around to it" list for literally decades -- the original 1980 classic Fame.

The late great movie critic Robert Ebert wrote a review of Fame when it was originally released that is so good, so beautifully descriptive, that I'll quote part of it here (I certainly can't write anything better):

    "Fame" is a genuine treasure, moving and entertaining, a movie that                 understands being a teen-ager as well as Breaking Away did, but studies its      characters in a completely different milieu. It's the other side of the coin: A        big-city, aggressive, cranked-up movie to play against the quieter traditions of     Breaking Away's small Indiana college town. Fame is all New York City. It's    populated by rich kids, ghetto kids, kids with real talent, and kids with mothers     who think they have real talent. They all go into the hopper, into a high school    of kids who are worked harder because they're "special" -- even if they're secretly not so sure they're so special.

Fame centers around a bunch of kids over their four years at the High School of the Performing Arts, otherwise known as "LaGuardia." On the one hand they are regular high school kids, blossoming teenagers with all the regular wants and fears and academic pressures, but, in addition to their studies, they are also training to become actors, dancers, and musicians. Drawn to the school from all walks of life, from across all five boroughs -- rich and poor, black and white, very talented to barely talented -- they work hard, dream hard, and experience numerous joys and heartbreaks. The movie centers around Montgomery, an actor and closeted homosexual; Lisa, a dancer who becomes an actor; Coco -- a dancer and singer; LeRoy, a dancer who is as troubled as he is talented; Ralph, an actor and aspiring comedian, along with Doris, a shy fellow actor who falls in love with him; Bruno, a brilliant musician; and Hillary, a wise-cracking dancer who falls in love with LeRoy. The movie does not have a simple, straightforward plot but, instead, shows a series of interlinking stories, following the characters as their lives change and evolve over their four years together.

Released in May 1980, Fame became a sensation, a surprise box office hit considering that it had no famous stars, no simple or traditional plot, and was about, of all things, a bunch of odd-looking teenagers at a performing arts high school in NYC. It came at a pivotal moment for both New York City and America: NYC was still recovering from its mid-1970s almost-bankruptcy, and was still plagued with its "Fear City" moniker; culturally, however, it was thriving -- "Saturday Night Live" was the hottest thing on TV, Woody Allen was at the height of his career, Studio 54 was raging, and Broadway had big shows like "A Chorus Line" and "Annie" running. And then here comes along this little gem of a movie about a bunch of ragtag NYC kids trying to make it through high school while starting a career in the arts -- and audiences loved it.

America, on the other hand, was changing -- Ronald Reagan and the triumph of cultural and economic conservative was months away, and the country seemed more than ready to rid itself of the tumult of the 1960s and '70s. Fame, in some ways, was a last hurrah of that era, a paean to a time that was troubled but also creatively alive and exciting, a celebration of the arts and artists, and a love letter to NYC, a city that the rest of the country loved to hate. It was an early middle-finger to the political and cultural world to come -- but also, ironically, the unofficial beginning of the 1980s teen movie crazy.

Even though the movie is called Fame, it could also have been called "Sweaty" -- the students literally sweat for their art (especially the dancers) as much as they are sweating about their futures of making it in showbusiness. There are many uncomfortable scenes where the characters face the limitations of their talents, their relationships, their aspirations, their place in this crazy world of the arts. While this movie is a celebration of the artistic spirit, it's not sentimental in any way -- it brutally shows you the grimy, often sleazy showbiz world these kids inhabit, without sugarcoating it.

In that way, it's a real NYC movie.

As you might imagine, Fame is full of amazing acting, dancing and music. There are beautiful scenes of dancers moving gracefully, of musicians giving their all to make the best sounds they're capable of, of actors trying to nail a scene, and also wonderful show-stopping songs. These include the Oscar-winning title song "Fame (I'm Gonna Live Forever)", "Out Here on My Own", "Hot Lunch", and the amazing final number "I Sing the Body Electric" that is performed in rousing spirit at graduation. Everyone in the whole movie sings, "And in time, and in time, we will all ... be ... stars!" Most of them, of course, will never become stars -- but they can and should always dream.

And that's what this movie is all about -- always dreaming, never giving up, even when the world tells you that you should.

Fame has had a surprising after-life since it came out over 42 years ago. In 1982, it became a TV show that ran for five years, with some of the movie's actors joining the show along with a whole new cast of characters and stories. In the late 1990s there was a second, short-running series called "Fame: LA" with all new characters and stories set on the West Coast. And then, in 2009, there was a remake called, unimaginatively, Fame that the critics hated but had some box office success (Kelsey Grammer was in it if you can believe it). Fame was a forerunner to other "I wanna be in showbusiness" projects like Smash or Glee or even The Marvelous Mrs Maisel. In seems, in this era of a million TV shows, like the Fame property or IP or whatever is just ripe for a comeback -- heck, if they can bring back Full House and Quantum Leap, why not Fame?

A few ironies about this movie and my review of it:

First, the director. Even though Fame is a down-and-dirty NYC movie, it was directed by a British guy -- Alan Parker -- whose previous film had been the intense, Oscar-winning, Turkish-set triller, Midnight Express. Fame was obviously a big change of pace, and he would go on to direct other arts-centric movies like The Commitments and other intense movies like Mississippi Burning. A great talent, he died in 2020.

Second, Irene Cara. Oh, how I loved her! I was already planning to write this review before I learned, just days ago, that Irene Cara who played Coco in "Fame" had died at the age of 63. She is amazing in this movie, and performs its most brutal, emotionally intense scene. She also sings most of the songs, luminously, and, if someone became a big star out of "Fame", it was her. Three years later she would win an Oscar and a Grammy for writing and singing the song "Flashdance ... What a Feeling!", easily the best dance pop song ever. She was an amazing talent whose career and life ended far too early -- but her songs will truly "live forever."

Third, and finally, my "history" (of sorts) with Antonia Franceschi, who plays the funny, horny, and super-talented dancer Hillary in Fame. Antonia was a young aspiring dancer at the School of American Ballet when she was cast in Fame and, interestingly enough, even though the movie became a huge hit, Antonia eschewed an acting career to spend the next twelve years as a dancer at the New York City Ballet before embarking on a long career as a choreographer. Very recently, I contacted her to see if she would do an interview for this blog but it didn't quite work out, even though she was very polite and informative in her replies.

But here is the plot twist (of sorts) that was promised ... drum roll ...

I've blogged about how, back in the mid-1980s, I appeared in "The Nutcracker" at the New York City Ballet. Well, I recently went back to look at one of the old programs I saved for my run in "The Nutcracker" and guess who appeared with me (and many others) in the opening party-scene -- that's right, Antonia Franceschi! So yours truly, Mr NYC, has performed on stage with a cast member from Fame! How cool is that?

Fame is truly a classic, a movie that may be decades old but that feels so fresh, so alive, so true-to-life that it never gets old, never gets boring, never feels outdated.

It's a must-watch for anyone whoever was young, whoever loved the arts, and whoever loved NYC.

Hakeem Makes History

 

The Latest Map of NYC

Corner of 77th & Central Park West - November 24th, 2022, 5:31 PM

Two wise men, looking down on Central Park West.

Old Downtown Lives Again

There are fewer stars that shine brighter -- and here on Earth -- than Barbara Streisand. One of the most famous, beloved, and acclaimed singer and actresses (and even director) of all time, she has blazed a glorious trail, a Jewish girl from Brooklyn who conquered showbusiness and Hollywood in the 1960s -- and continues to reign to this day. 

Movies like Funny Girl, The Way We Were, A Star is Born, Yentl, The Prince of Tides, The Mirror Has Two Faces and others have burnished her in cinematic history. Her songs -- and that voice! -- are instantly recognizable. She is one of the most famous entertainers who ever lived.

So now, after more than 60 years in showbusiness, Barbara is going back to the beggining. She has a released a new album, Live At the Bon Soir, that is a recording of performances she gave at the funky Greenwich Village basement nightclub in early November 1962 when she was just starting out. She croons old-timey songs, her voice so young and energetic, and there is such a confidence, such a pure beauty in her voice that it's no surprise that she became a huge star in the years right after. This album has apparently been sitting in Barbara's vault for more than half-a-century and only now is she giving it to the world. The world of old downtown Manhattan, of the early 1960s Greenwich Village arts scene, is long gone but these recordings, and Barbra's talent, are perennial -- a reminder that great work leaves an lasting legacy. 

But not all of old Downtown is gone -- on Elizabeth Street, in what is today called NoLita, is a butcher shop that's been in business since 1923 and is still going strong: Albanese Meats and Poultry. It's now being run by the 4th generation of the Albanese family, its super-old fashioned meat story in one of the city's trendiest neighborhoods. Everything about this place is old school and yet it's not old school -- it is a living, breathing part of Downtown, old but not out. 

Downtown, like NYC as a whole, is always alive -- even in the past.

Museum of Broadway

History is being made every day, everywhere -- especially in NYC.

In every neighborhood and borough, all throughout the city, history is forged on the streets and behind closed doors, the future being made minute-by-minute, hour-by-hour.

So what makes the new Museum of Broadway fascinating is that, like all museums, it is a repository of history and art but, unlike most museum, it is surrounded by the very institution -- the Broadway theater -- that is a living, breathing entity, making history each day with every performance. This new museum is, in many ways, a living memory bank of this city's greatest cultural export.

I can't wait to see it! 

Reel 13

It's always a little depressing to stay home on a Saturday night, especially in NYC. However, when you have young kids, you find yourself at home on such nights more often than not (unless you want to bankrupt yourself on babysitters).

In the age of streaming services there's literally billions of hours of "content" to watch when you're stuck at home on Saturday nights. However, for my money (or actually, for no money), the best thing you can do at home on Saturday nights in NYC is watch Reel 13 on Channel 13.

Unlike a streaming service that overwhelms and blinds you with more movies or TV shows than you could possibly ever watch, Reel 13 is a carefully curated selection of two movies and a short film, shown on Saturday nights, chosen specifically for an NYC audience. There's a 9 PM main feature that's usually a classic film (like Citizen Kane or Dr. Zhivago or An American in Paris), often followed by an independent film that was produced in the last few years (like 2014's A Most Wanted Man which was Phillip Seymour Hoffman's last movie). In between both films is a short feature that viewers can chose by voting for on the homepage. There's even a host, usually a film professor from Columbia or NYU, who does a short intro or outro.

It's a friendly, fun, and culturally edifying experience, and helps fight against the "at-home on Saturday night" blues. 

Some of the best things in life are free -- even in NYC.

Kathy!

Blood Moon NYC

Imperial City

If you think about it, the composition of New York City is crazy -- five counties of varying sizes and shapes, a collection of forty-something islands in a political mishmash, the map of which looks like some kind of modern art masterpiece. 

That's because NYC isn't really a city at all -- it's an empire, an Imperial City.

Prior to 1898, NYC was limited to Manhattan and large swaths of the Bronx (it included villages that had been incorporated). Brooklyn was its own large city. Queens and Richmond (now Staten Island) were like the counties upstate and on Long Island, a collection of towns and villages.

Consolidation, obviously, changed all that, making the political marriage of these cities and counties into one whole place called Greater New York -- but it was not a marriage of five equals. Manhattan, pre-1898 New York City, basically annexed its neighbors with political and economic pressure the same way the other powerful countries have (peacefully and violently) absorbed foreign lands, turning their solitary realms into expansive empires (think Tsarist Russia or Austria-Hungary). 

Today, we take it for granted that NYC is the way it is, the biggest city (by far) in the country, one of the greatest in the entire world. But our Imperial City was not always destined to be so -- it was a long, brutal, slog, and was largely the vision of one man, Andrew Haswell Green.

I've blogged about how consolidation happened before (most recently in 2017) but what I never appreciated until now how this city really does resemble an empire -- and how comparing NYC to any other city in the country is really an exercise in futility. It's so much larger, so much more complex, than any other city in the USA that it's like comparing an calculus problem to an algebra problem -- it's in a different league of complexity.

And, in some ways, geographically, NYC is like many great empires with a core city or country (Manhattan) with territories that spread out in multiple-directions beyond its borders. 

Think I'm wrong? Just think about how we talk about the "outer-boroughs" vs. Manhattan (which I guess we should call the "inner-borough"), think about the understated resentment that exists between Manhattanites and non-Manhattanites, between the "bridge-and-tunnel" crowd and those who live in, and refer to, "the city." 

That's what makes empire and what makes NYC America's Imperial City, a mini-empire inside a country that, if you think about it, is an empire as well. 

My Scott Shannon Story

In the annals of NYC morning radio, no DJ except Howard Stern (and probably Jim Kerr) is as legendary as Scott Shannon.

For nearly 40 years, he's been waking up this city with his hypnotic timber. After working in Florida, he came to NYC in 1983 and started the "Z-Morning Zoo" on Z100, a widely imitated morning radio show format of wacky phone calls, in-studio guest, stunts, and music interspersed with news and traffic. After a brief hiatus in LA, Scott returned to NYC and spent roughly 23 years at WPLJ where he co-hosted "Scott and Todd in the Morning", one of the longest running duos in morning radio history. Then, in 2014, he left WPLJ (five years before it ceased to exist) and did mornings at WCBS-FM -- and he'll be retiring from there, and from morning radio, this December.

I've blogged in years past about how, one summer in the 1990s, I was an intern at WPLJ. It was a pop music station with the forgettable slogan, "No rap, no hard stuff, no sleepy elevator music. Just the best songs on the radio!" At the time I was too ignorant to understand this dog whistle to mean, "No black stuff, no dirty stuff, no weird stuff. Just boring square white music!"

Anyhoo, Scott Shannon was in his "Scott and Todd" heyday and was a really big deal at the station. Not only was he the morning guy but he was also the program director, so he was treated as a God at the station. As a lowly intern, I had almost no contact with him -- except one day where I was given a huge stack of letters to fax (remember fax machines?) which happened to be located right next to his office. I spent the better part of this day just faxing stuff, and Scott Shannon would be in and out of his office, passing me by. He mostly ignored me but then, out of nowhere, he asked me if I "got chicks." I was a hopelessly nerdy no-girl getting shrimp so I just laughed nervously. So he started calling me "Chick Magnet!" Every time he walked in and out of the office he'd shout "Chick magnet!" For the rest of my internship, whenever I passed him by, "Chick magnet!" My only other interactions with him were when he asked me to fax something for him (I obliged) and then when he talked up and put his fingers around one of my wrists, telling me he couldn't believe how thin my wrist was. He was right, but it was weird.

Anyway, I never saw or thought about him or WPLJ for years after I left until the station went off the air in 2019. And, honestly, Mr Shannon was quite nice to me. So I congratulate him on a long career and wish him a happy retirement. His legacy in NYC radio is quite secure.  

What Happened to Millionaire's Row?

Review: "Escape from New York" (1981) and "Single White Female" (1992)

If you pay attention to the news, the media is full of hysterical fearmongering, trying to convince the denizens of this 8.8 million strong burg that it's a crime ridden hell-hole, a dystopia of sorts.

This, of course, is nonsense -- crime remains WAY lower than it was even twenty-years ago, the city is quite safe -- but fear sells, helps otherwise unpopular (i.e. Republican) politicians get elected, the media does everything to help them, and they use it to pursue an agenda in government that no one actually likes. 

It's happened before and will go on and on, ad infinitum. 

New York City is in no ways a dystopia but the image of the city as some kind of scary place persists. Obviously this has been captured in movies such as Taxi Driver and The Warriors from the 1970s, at a time when the city really did seem to be verging on the dystopic.

Two other movies, very different in premise and plot, show another way that NYC might be dystopic. They couldn't be more different in story and tone, as one is totally surreal and out-there while the other is disturbingly believable and possible -- and something some New Yorkers have really dealt with.

Escape from New York (1981) by John Carpenter is about how Manhattan island, in the year 1997(!) has become a literal wall-off prison where the most dangerous criminals have been sent to live out their lives in an abandoned urban jungle. When Air Force One crashes into the island (thanks to terrorists from the Soviet Union which the USA is at war with), a prisoner named Snake (Kurt Russell) is sent-in to rescue the President in 24-hours -- or he'll literally die. Along the way, he recruits a bizarro cab driver played by Ernest Borgnine and a man from Snake's past played by Harry Dean Stanton. There's also a hot chick and lots of weirdos who follow Snake on his mission, trying to free the president from the crime lord who rules this hell-hole played by, of all people, Isaac Hayes (he of "Shaft" fame). While the premise from Escape from New York is insane, it's a remarkably straight-forward and smartly paced action movie -- and unlike movies today that are non-stop action sequences with tiny bits of plot, in this movie the plot drives the action, and there actually isn't that much violence. And Kurt Russell shows what a great leading man he is, and why he's had a very long career. If you want to see the ultimate NYC as dystopia movie, this is it. 

Then there's Single White Female (1992). Now this is a scary movie -- it should have been called These White Bitches Are Crazy! This is a believably dystopic story -- in fact, the only unbelievable thing about it is that two underemployed women could afford a huge apartment in the Ansonia. This is about how the greatest danger you can find in this city might literally be in your own home! Bridget Fonda stars as a woman named Allie who finds out that her handsome fiance is cheating so she kicks him out and gets a roommate named Hedy (Jennifer Jason Leigh, brilliant as always). At first Allie and Hedy get along great, become friends, and life seems good. But when Allie gets back together with the fiance, all goes wrong -- Hedy becomes jealous, starts to pretend to be Allie, tries to seduce the fiance, tries to take over herself and become Allie -- and all hell breaks loose. This is the NYC  dystopia in the form of the roommate from hell, how our worst dystopia isn't a city full of criminals but a house full of craziness. It's also just a really good  mainstream thriller, the kind of movie they don't make anymore. 

Of course, if NYC had someone who helped to make the city a transportation dystopia that persists to this day -- Robert Moses, the 20th century "master builder" who rammed highways all over town and starved public transportation. There's a new play about him on Broadway played by, of all people, Ralph Fiennes called Straight Line Crazy. Believe it or not, even though it's about a famous New Yorker, this play is a fully British production -- Brit actor, writer, and director, first premiering at the National Theater in London. This news story about the play is fascinating -- watching Ralph Fiennes describe how Robert Moses wanted to thrust a highway in Lower Manhattan is bizarre and amazing to watch. 

Ted Cruz Gets a Bronx Welcome

New York values, beautifully on display. 

Ken Auletta Talks Harvey Weinstein @ Queens Public Library

"American Horror Story: NYC"

 

Feral City

Like something out of a dystopian horror movie, most New Yorkers spent the year 2020 indoors, leaving the city streets mostly empties, the storefronts mostly shut. In large swaths of NYC, the neighborhoods felt abandoned, forlorn, empty, drained of the vitality of that makes this city great. 

But not everyone felt that way, specifically my NYC fellow blogger Jeremiah Moss Vanishing New York. 

He loves the fact that the city felt left behind. He loved that tons of rich people skipped town and left the city to us smallfolk. He loved that the people one often found on the streets were the freaks, the weirdos, the homeless, the vagrants, the people society mostly looks down on, the Others.

For a brief moment, it became their city.

This is not how most New Yorkers feel, of course. Crime went up sharply, (here and everywhere around the country), and we're still dealing with it. But Jeremiah, in a new book called Feral New York, offers a contrarian view, arguing that NYC in the worst of times was actually experiencing the best of times, that COVID was an unlikely gift to the least amongst us in the city. The gentrifiers were (temporarily) ceding their power, the "poetry of the streets" taking their place. 

The city became "feral" -- and Jeremiah dug that.

Of course, for people who lost jobs, for people who got sick, for people whose lives were completely upending and are stilling dealing with the aftermath, this thesis will be a hard sell. But it's an interesting take, nonetheless, an offbeat look at a very weird time, and what's more NYC than that?

Fond Farewells

Though they couldn't be more different, two events happened this week that marked the passage of time, the end of eras in the history of NYC culture.

First, the passing of legendary stage, screen and TV actress Angela Lansbury. What can one say about this amazing talent who could sing and act like no one else, whose career spanned from roughly 1944 to 2018, who appeared in brilliant films like Gaslight (1944), The Manchurian Candidate (1962) and Bedknobs and Broomsticks (1971, one of my wife's favorites), a decade-plus run on TV with Murder, She Wrote (1984-1996) -- and multiple roles on Broadway including Mame, Sweeney Todd, and Blithe Spirit (amongst many others) that won her a total of 5 Tony Awards? She was an acting legend's legend, someone who made Broadway the truly "great" White Way, and we'll probably never see her likes again -- we only got to enjoy her talent for almost 80 years. 

Second, the news that the "news" will be replacing the music on that spot on the NYC radio dial 92.3 FM. It's been a music station for decades starting in the 1940s, and in the 1970s it became an all-disco station (WKTU) before becoming K-ROCK, a classic rock station in 1980s -- the station that thrust Howard Stern into the cultural firmament of NYC, then the rest of the country (I blogged about this in 2019). Howard went to satellite in 2006, and K-ROCK floundered, changing formats to "hot talk" then back to music, finally becoming "Alt 92.3" -- but now the station will dump music altogether and instead simulcast its sister station 1010 WINS, the "all news, all the time" station that keeps NYC moving (plus they "give you the world" in 22 minutes). K-ROCK was also the station of Allison Steele, Vin Scelsa, and lots of great music so it's sad to see it vanish into the ether, to become essentially an FM-offshoot of an all-news station -- but in this era of podcasting, streaming, etc. radio is in decline, and this just proves it. RIP 92.3 FM, and thanks for the memories. 

Memo from NYC

Thirty-years ago this month a little arthouse movie opened that portended a cultural revolution: Reservoir Dogs, the debut of director Quentin Tarantino, was a smart, violent, funny, thoughtful look at a bunch of professional criminals carrying out a jewelry heist that goes very wrong. It was a 1990s movie inspired by a 1970s grindhouse aesthetic, and a rare film where the storytelling and dialogue were as compelling as the action. 

There are many memorable moments in Reservoir Dogs: the opening where "the dogs" sit around and talk casually about Madonna and tipping waitresses before going to commit a violent crime; the gruesome, infamous ear-slicing scene; the "commode story" sequence where one of the characters tells a tall tale, and an enormous amount of tension is built up, about something that actually never happened; the debate about how "black bitches", unlike "white bitches", don't tolerate abusive men, along with a reminiscences of 1970s show Get Christy Love (catchphrase: "You're under arrest, sugah'!"); the assignment of the characters names like Mr White, Mr Blue, Mr Orange, and Mr Pink ("'Cause you're a faggot alright!"). And, of course, the brutal ending. 

For me, however, the best part is "K-Billy Super Sounds of the '70s", a radio show that plays throughout the movie and introduces the various songs we hear. K-Billy is voiced by a super-deadpanning Steven Wright, a flat monotone that contrasts with the hyper-violence and over-the-top behavior we see throughout the movie.

When this movie came out, I was in high school, and had fallen in love with the idea of being a "personality DJ", a voice that haunted the city and that gave resonance to the music being played. This was the time of Allison Steele and Scott Muni, and when Howard Stern was at his most outrageous self. This was before corporate-consolidation and voice-tracking and podcasts drained the life out of music radio -- the voice made the music, the music became something deeper, and it did so brilliantly in Reservoir Dogs. 

The Challenges of the Super City: Serious & Funny Perspectives

A Rainy Day in NYC

Yesterday, Tuesday, October 4th, was a rainy one in NYC. In fact, it was so rainy that a transformer near my house got flooded and we lost power in our kitchen. But enough about our good times -- yesterday was one of those days where two unrelated yet nonetheless semi-historic events took place that proves this city is and will forever be fascinating.

First, a princess took the ferry -- literally. Princess Anne, the daughter of the late Queen Elizabeth II, came to town for a bunch of events (I guess she's back at work now) and one of her excursions included taking the Staten Island Ferry. Don't worry, the princess is married so I don't think she was traveling to the Forgotten Borough in order to date Pete Davidson. Instead, her highness took in a unique and fascinating view of NYC -- even if it was in a rainy haze. I hope she had a good voyage.

Second, and most notable, Aaron Judge of the New York Yankees hit homerun 62 in a single season for the American League, besting Yankee Roger Maris' record from the 1960s. Now this isn't the first time 62 homeruns has been achieved in a single season. Mark McGwire and Sammy Sosa did it in 1998, then Barry Bonds did it in 2001. However, it's been revealed that they did this from using performance-enhancing steroids so Judge's presumably drug-free achievement is all the more remarkable. Sadly, he didn't hit this homerun in NYC -- it was down in Texas against the Rangers -- but nonetheless it's a big win for the city as well as for him and his team. Congrats.

And it all happened on one rainy day in New York City. 

25 Essential New York City Tips in 10 Minutes

Out On The Streets

The streets of NYC have so much romance attached to them that there have literally been great songs written in their honor  -- "The Sidewalks of New York", "Across 110th Street", and "Positively 4th Street" just to name a few.  

Right now, and until the end of October, there's an exhibit in Greenwich Village called Village Voices 2002 where, on the streets of the beloved neighborhood, there are boxes with small exhibits and recordings that tell you the history of the streets their located on. 

The streets of NYC have a magic to them, representing the limitless possibilities of this city in concrete and steel.

But the streets of NYC also have an obvious menace. Danger lurks on them, intertwined with the glamour and excitement of the city. And while the streets of NYC are always fascinating to traverse, it's another thing if that's where you have to live, where you are forced to make your home. The expression "out on the streets" is as scary a threat as there is.

One Year, a podcast series that chronicles little-known or forgotten news stories from years past (recent seasons were 1977 and 1995) is currently doing a season on 1986. Their latest and last episode from this season is called "The Man From Fifth Avenue" about a movie of the same name that none of us have ever or will ever see but that became something a scandal in that summer 36 years ago. It follows a man named Joe being evicted from his apartment on the Upper West Side -- he faces life "on the streets", hurtling towards certain death in penury. This episode, which is a must-listen, tells the story of this man and his predicament, a fascinating NYC story that is way more complicated and with a much more unbelievable backstory than any of us could have imagined.

So why was the The Man From Fifth Avenue a scandal? Because it was -- ready for this? -- a piece of communist Soviet propaganda. This "movie" was created, with Joe as the willing tool, to demonstrate the greed and cruelty of American capitalism to Soviet citizens, to make them appreciate their "workers paradise" -- never mind that their country had many homeless people "on the streets" too. The problem for the USSR was that this movie came out around the same time as the Chernobyl disaster that would expose the venal dishonesty and incompetence of the Soviet system -- and that would lead to its demise five years later. 

There's another way to think about this movie and how it relates to our lives today: it was an early piece of disinformation -- although this time targeted at the Russians and not Americans -- that would eventually come back to haunt us in our presidential election 30 years later. It's also a reminder that while communism fell in the Soviet Union/Russia, what came afterwards was equally scary. And, closer to home, it was an example of dislocation and gentrification that have rocked NYC in the decades since. This propagandistic movie was a giant lie that also exposed certain uncomfortable truths. 

The streets of NYC have always held, and always will hold, so much promise and so much danger. 

Farewell to the "Phantom"

There are certain things we know are going to happen but still can't believe it when they do -- like graduating from school, the death of elderly relatives, the end of our favorite TV shows.

This month saw two such non-surprises surprises: the death of Queen Elizabeth II after 70 years on the British throne and the announcement that The Phantom of the Opera will close in February, 2023. It opened in January, 1988 so it will end after just over 35 years, the longest-running show -- by far -- in Broadway history.

In fact, it ran for nearly half the length of QE2's reign.

The changes to Broadway, NYC, and America between 1988 and now are almost impossible to list. Needless to say, it opened in a very different time and city from when it will sing its swan song. Still, much like QE2, it's had a run that will be almost impossible to top -- and a place burnished in cultural history. 

Roxy Music @ MSG, September 12, 2022 -- "Same Old Scene"

 

Blair Brown Introduces "Into the Woods" for American Playhouse -- March 15, 1991

Currently on Broadway there is a massively successful revival of Stephen Sondheim's 1980s musical Into the Woods, a brilliant integration and revisionist takes on the Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood, Jack and the Beanstalk, and Rapunzel fairy tales. It's a very funny, fast-moving show, the songs and music are incredible, and it's one of Sondheim's last great musicals, a master at the top of his game.

In the decades since, Into the Woods has been revived a few times on Broadway and elsewhere, and even become a hit 2014 movie. Apparently this latest revival is the best yet, and a whole new generation is discovering this brilliant work. 

In 1991, a few years after the original Broadway run, a taped version of Into the Woods was show on the now sadly defunct PBS series "American Playhouse." Back then, there was no streaming, no YouTube, you couldn't just search and dial up a recording of a Broadway show. So if you hadn't seen the actual production on Broadway, there was nowhere else to see it -- except if you tuned in for this special presentation on March 15, 1991.

March of 1991 was an interesting time -- in what was one of the first viral videos, motorist Rodney King was recorded getting beaten by the LAPD, the first Gulf War had just ended, and the now classic movie The Silence of the Lambs was burning up the box office.

Blair Brown was a television star at the time, her show The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd was still running (although about to go off the air). In an odd way, she and this show were both quintessential NYC cultural landmarks of the time, so it was appropriate that she would introduce this special airing of it -- which also includes an interview with Sondheim itself. 

So here's a look at a special moment in time more than 30 years ago -- for something that has proven to be truly timeless. 

Crises? What Crises?

Public service is generally defined as serving in a job, often in government, where your work is to better the lives of the general public. That's generally how public service has been understood throughout American history.

Elected officials, politicians, are two things at once: public servants but also celebrities of a sort -- they need to have a certain charisma, "star power", magnetism of some sort that gets lots and lots of people to vote for them (at least get more votes than their opponents) and often has little to do with their qualifications or competence for the actual work of the job.

Something interesting has happened in last decade or two -- now we have politicians who clearly have no interest in serving the public, who don't care about doing the actual job. They just want to be a celebrity. 

Sarah Palin and then Trump are classic examples. But we have one big one closer to home.

Mayor Eric Adams is the very model of a modern politician -- he doesn't actually care about governing, he's not much interested in policy. He likes to hang out at nightclubs and rant about crime but doesn't seem have any vision, any policies, any ideas about helping the general public.

There are twin crises in NYC today that Mayor Adams seems wholly indifferent to:

1. The fact that, in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, generations of Hasidic children are not receiving a proper education or being prepared for adult life, all of which is being partially subsidized by taxpayers. The New York Times published a bombshell investigation about how a huge number of Hasidic children are essentially living in a mini-North Korea. Adams response? It's no big deal. To be fair, this has been a years-long, bipartisan disgrace but this has been fully exposed on Adams watch -- and his response is to do nothing.

2. The odious thing about the conservative political movement is to say that government doesn't work and then, when they get control of the government, make sure it doesn't. There is currently a crises in the staffing of the municipal government because the salaries are too low, there are no work-from-home options, and attrition since COVID began has been awful. Again, Adams doesn't see a problem with this and, in fact, has contributed to the problem -- he wants the city government to lowball salaries to applicants for city jobs and has been totally inflexible on them working from home. 

Ross Barkan, a three-time Mr NYC interviewee, has a great new article about how Mayor Adams doesn't see this as a crises because he doesn't see governing as a priority. The depressing thing is that Adams is not an outlier, not the exception to the rule: he is the rule, he's the standard of today's politician who do nothing policy-wise, claim to have no responsibility for anything, and preen for cameras and social media feeds. 

So if you wonder why problems in today's city, today's country, today's society remain unresolved, this is why.

NY1 & "Quantum Leap": 30 Years Old and Going Strong

This month, two totally unrelated but nonetheless interesting (to me) things on TV are happening:

1. The local cable news channel NY1 just turned 30 years old -- it first hit the air on September 8th, 1992 in a very different time and city. First something of a curiosity -- a 24/7 news station dedicated only to NYC news? -- it's become a beloved staple of city, a vital necessity to life for almost all New Yorkers. Here's what NY1 looked like in the early days:

2. If you've read this blog long enough you'll learn about some the of the music, movies, books, and TV shows that Mr NYC loves. One of them is the early 1990s show Quantum Leap about a time traveler who "leaps" into different lives between the 1950s and 1980s. The original brilliant series went off the air in 1993 but -- guess what? -- it's back! A reboot, more like a continuation, of the series debuts later this month and I'm eager to see it. I certainly hope it's good.

There were many episodes of Quantum Leap set in NYC and I've blogged about them. Also, a couple of years ago, I even interviewed the costumer designer of the original series who gave some great behind the scenes anecdotes of the show. You can read all the Mr NYC Quantum Leap coverage here. 

NYC Mourns Queen Elizabeth II

Sterling Lord RIP

One of my favorite books is Jack Kerouac's 1957 classic On the Road, the quintessential 20th American adventure story of two lost souls who have "Nothing behind me, everything ahead of me, as is ever so on the the road."

Famously Kerouac wrote the novel on a giant scroll in three weeks but it took four years to get published, thanks to a man named Sterling Lord. A brilliant agent, he managed to get the down-on-his-luck Kerouac $1,000 for the book that wound-up burnishing the writer, and Beat generation, into America culture.

Later on, Lord would represent, amongst many other writers Ken Kesey for One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Nicholas Pileggi for Wiseguy that became the great movie Goodfellas. 

Born, raised, and educated in Iowa, Lord migrated to NYC as an adult to become the gold-standard for literary agents. His legacy was immense. He was the "guy-behind-the-guy," the patron and promoter of great work who recognized genius and then shared it with all of us. 

Sterling Lord has died at the age of 102 -- long-outliving some of his more famous clients who lived fast, hard and, like Kerouac, died much too young. 

What an amazing life and legacy Sterling Lord left us. RIP.

Mr NYC in an Undisclosed Location